


Heights

by Transposable_Element



Category: Green Sky Trilogy - Zilpha Keatley Snyder
Genre: Fear of Heights, Ficlet, Flying, Gen, Rare Fandoms, Tree Houses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-16
Updated: 2014-10-16
Packaged: 2018-02-21 11:10:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2466140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Transposable_Element/pseuds/Transposable_Element
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p><i>In memorium</i> Zilpha Keatley Snyder</p>
    </blockquote>





	Heights

**Author's Note:**

> _In memorium_ Zilpha Keatley Snyder

Veena had lived in the heights for thirty years, but when she stepped to the edge of the branch path and raised the wing panels of her shuba, she didn’t launch herself unhesitatingly into the glide path as her Kindar bond-partner did. She always paused and braced herself, a hesitation so brief that nobody else noticed it, before allowing herself to fall forward into the empty air. 

Once she was in a glide she felt safe, and exhilarated. She never tired of the sense of weightlessness, the feeling of boundless space, the push and pull of the winds, the way the air seemed almost a living thing. Like many Erdlings she felt that gliding was the ultimate expression of freedom, in both symbol and reality.

People said she was more skilled at gliding than many who had been born to it. She had worked and practiced, learning to adjust her shuba so as to use air currents and updrafts to take her where she wanted to go in a single glide, instead of having to land frequently to walk or climb to another glide path, as so many Erdlings did even after decades in the heights. Nobody, not even her bond-partner, knew about the moment of unreasoning panic, the last unconquerable fear, that had motivated her to learn to glide so expertly, so as to avoid having to make another leap. 


End file.
